


Let the Fire Burn Me Back to Life

by throwupsparkles



Category: Fall Out Boy
Genre: Depression, Friends to Lovers, Hiatus, Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:33:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25099966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/throwupsparkles/pseuds/throwupsparkles
Summary: Patrick had dumped the dirty sheets on the floor and sat next to Pete’s blubbering form on the floor. He put a hand on his back, comforting and solid against the world that felt like it could dissolve at any moment, and whispered, “I know.”It wasn’t patronizing. It wasn’t empty comfort. Patrick did know. Because Patrick knew him.
Relationships: Patrick Stump/Pete Wentz
Comments: 22
Kudos: 86





	Let the Fire Burn Me Back to Life

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to [TooRational](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TooRational/pseuds/TooRational) for feeding my Peterick obsession with interviews, theories, and fanfics. Also, of course, thank you for listening to me rant about this fic and then actually reading it before I posted it, you're awesome! <3

Pete doesn’t know why Patrick even bothers. 

But he’s here every other day with another takeout bag in one hand and a cup of tea in the other. Chamomile tea, because apparently that helps with anxiety. Pete’s pretty sure there’s nothing magical about dirty tasting water, but he knows better than to argue with Patrick. Especially when he’s in Take-Care-Of-Pete-Mode.

He pushes his way through the door and sets the bag of--Christy’s Pancake Tavern!--down along with the thermos of tea. “I got you blueberry and pecan, I forget which one you like more these days,” he says, looking up at Pete to say something, but he just shrugs, so Patrick sighs and starts unloading styrofoam containers of sugary carbs. Patrick always brings Pete carbs.

He lets Patrick fuss over the packets of butter and syrup then he mutters, “fuck it,” and tosses them in the trash before grabbing the bottle of syrup and tub of butter from the fridge. Pete presses his lips together to keep from laughing as Patrick dumps way too much syrup on his own stack and huffs, all pink and irritated, before settling on the bar stool at the kitchen island. He takes a bite then looks up and raises his eyebrow at Pete expectantly when he notices that he still hasn’t moved from his spot. “Pancakes will get cold.”

Pete smiles softly and sits down next to him. He takes a bite, and the richness of the butter combined with the sticky sweetness makes him roll his eyes in the back of his head. He doesn’t know why he forgets to eat, but he’s always relieved after the first bite. He lays his head on Patrick’s shoulder, who doesn’t complain when Pete drops a dollop of syrup on his cardigan by accident on his next bite. He just lets out a sigh of relief and pats his knee. 

Because this is such an improvement from where they were a few weeks ago when Pete was laying in bed all day not responding to Patrick’s emails. To be fair, Patrick ignored Pete first. Patrick had shown up with the key Pete had given him for emergencies. Pete hadn’t been on social media for days, it was an emergency. 

Pete doesn’t like to think about the day that Patrick found him nestled in dirty blankets and weeks old clothing. Doesn’t like to remember the way Patrick’s eyes flashed over the little orange pill bottles cluttered on his nightstand. 

Patrick had climbed onto the mattress and laid on his stomach, head turned and looking at Pete. Pete remembers thinking how different Patrick looked. Not just the bleached hair and significant weight loss, but in the way that he looked broken too. 

“Hey, lunchbox,” Pete had said in a cheerful facade, trying to pull up the mask that was Pete Wentz. Tried to twist his chapped lips into a smirk and make his dull, weary eyes light up mischievously. 

Patrick had just reached out and traced the dark circles under his eyes and said “You need a shower.”

When Pete had come out of the shower and saw Patrick stripping his bed, the pill containers and liquor bottles gone, he slumped against the wall and broke down. For the first time since the band broke-- _ took a break _ \--and the divorce, he crumpled and sobbed. 

Patrick had dumped the dirty sheets on the floor and sat next to Pete’s blubbering form on the floor. He put a hand on his back, comforting and solid against the world that felt like it could dissolve at any moment, and whispered, “I know.”

It wasn’t patronizing. It wasn’t empty comfort. Patrick did know. Because Patrick knew  _ him _ . 

*

“What do you think of the drums here?” 

Pete blinks up from his phone and meets Patrick’s glasses framed eyes. He had missed those. He had been following Patrick during his solo thing with  _ Soul Punk _ and it had been so weird to be off to the sidelines while Patrick did his thing. Had  _ hurt _ that Patrick was making music without him. Because they were supposed to be taking a break, and when Patrick started making waves about a solo album it just solidified the theory that Patrick just wanted to be away from Pete. 

Pete had watched the clips on YouTube of Patrick’s live performances, too chickenshit to show up even though Patrick had extended the offer. Probably just out of pity since Pete’s own side project was spiraling down the drain. It just didn’t feel right to make music without Patrick. And he was bitter that Patrick seemed to be doing alright without him. 

“That doesn’t sound like  _ Soul Punk _ ,” Pete says softly, a little unsure what’s happening here. 

Patrick fixes him with that  _ Oh, Pete _ look that makes Pete want to crawl to him and hide under the bed at the same time. “That’s because it’s not.”

“I thought we were on hiatus.”

“We are.”

Pete looks back at his phone but he can’t focus on the stupid dog sweaters he was looking at on Esty now that Patrick has unlocked the door that Pete had chained up with the most heavy duty padlock he could find. Because he had all but accepted the fact that he would never be on stage with Patrick again. They would never have writing sessions again. He’d never hear his words spoken again, because if they weren’t coming from Patrick’s mouth it was like they didn’t truly exist. Like Pete didn’t truly exist. 

“Pete?”

Patrick has always sparked that intense fight or flight instinct within Pete. Fight. Yeah, they did a lot of that. Lots of screaming in studios, of tossed chairs and red faces. Lots of passive aggressive phone calls and ignored texts. But there was a part of Pete that loved that. A fucked up part maybe, but there was something soothing in the terse cadence of Patrick’s voice because it was  _ real _ . It wasn’t digitized through computer speakers. He was right here in front of him. 

Then there was that need to run. In the beginning it was the need to pick up Patrick and run him across state lines, push him to the edges of the country so that he could be on as many stages as Pete could sweet talk venue owners into letting them prance across. He needed the world to hear Patrick, and he needed Patrick to see the world. Towards the end though, it was Pete running backwards, retreating home. Because the world had gotten too cruel and his band was going up in flames. And it was like that  Orpheus story, the one where he went to Hell to save his lover and he would have been successful as long as he didn’t look back. Pete looked back. Of course he did. Because it didn’t make sense for Patrick to want to follow him in the first place. 

Sometimes it hurts to look at Patrick because all he can see is that seventeen year old he failed. 

“Pete?”

Pete looks up from his phone, “Sorry.”

Patrick frowns and closes his laptop, setting it on the coffee table. They’re sitting on opposite ends of the couch with their legs overlapping in the middle. Patrick reaches under the blanket that’s draped over their legs and rubs Pete’s calf. Patrick isn’t normally touchy-feely, he only does that when he’s trying to get through to Pete. Which fucking hurts right now, because he’s looking at this man who is supposed to be his best friend, who  _ feels _ like the man he loves, but looks like a fucking broken down stranger. 

And they’re walking on eggshells around each other. Patrick’s been showing up to his house off and on for about a month now and by now there would have been a big enough argument where Patrick would storm off and Pete would tweet something whiny, then Patrick would come back with a movie and gallon of ice cream. That was how they did things and the fact that they haven’t fought over anything yet is making Pete’s skin crawl. 

Because it’s not really fighting. Not the bad kind. Well...there had been bad fighting before. But the regular fighting that they did wasn’t detrimental, it wasn’t the same kind of screaming match that him and Ashlee used to have. It was the cathartic kind. The type that always left him breathless and body pulsing like it was one huge nerve, sensitive but satisfied. Like sex. Sometimes better than sex. 

“Let me in that head,” Patrick says softly, fingers digging methodically into his tired muscles. 

Pete thinks he should bite out  _ I didn’t think you cared _ or  _ you wanted a break from me _ . Something childish and bitter just like Pete Wentz. But he’s started to forget who that was, had lost him somewhere among the glossy pages of magazines and trending hashtags. 

Instead he sinks down into the couch and lets Patrick hands warm up his numb limbs. 

*

And then Patrick goes on tour.

Pete had been trying really hard not to grow dependent on Patrick again. He was mentally preparing himself for Patrick to fuck off like he should. Knew that the regular house visits were just pitying, maybe even a little selfish on Patrick’s part--like he was trying to soothe some internal guilt. As if he was equating Pete’s seemingly broken down state as all his doing. 

Pete kicks the take out bag that him and Patrick had been eating out of the other night. Of course Pete’s breakdown wasn’t even his own. Because everything that Pete did belonged to someone else. And he had himself to blame for that. He never wanted to be alone, so much so that he let others press into him, push and pull, kiss, caress, fuck,  _ use _ until Pete was morphed into a shape that would fit in to whatever mold it was that he had been chasing. 

_ From: Patrick--11:54PM _

_ Eat. _

Pete frowns at his phone and closes out his messages to go back to watching cats playing with iguanas on YouTube. 

Another message pops up. 

_ From: Patrick--12:09AM _

_ And drink water. Not Starbucks. WATER. _

Pete scoffs and goes back to his video. It’s not like he’s left the house in a month in a half, let alone go to Starbucks. But then his lips quirk up and he opens Patrick’s message back up. 

_ To: Patrick--12:11AM _

_ Starbucks has water. _

He doesn’t expect a phone call from that exchange. He usually gets a freeze out period whenever Pete acts childish when Patrick is trying to be all business. That and it wasn’t even anything, they’ve had blo--

“What did you do today?” Patrick asks, trampling over Pete’s thoughts. 

He sounds exhausted, his voice a little weak like he usually does after a show. And if Pete closes his eyes he’s right there next to him. He can feel the heat radiating off Patrick’s body and smell the sweat sour smell from his sweat drenched shirt. If Pete lets himself drift a little longer, he can imagine the flush on Patrick’s cheek, the wet, redness of his mouth.

“Um,” Pete says hoarsely, because he can’t really remember what he did today versus yesterday. He’s been laying in bed since Patrick left and he’s not sure how many days that’s been and where the divide between night and day is. It’s easy to do when he keeps the blackout shades down at all times. When Patrick’s here, he always draws them up. 

“Or since I left,” Patrick amends softly, like he knows Pete needs baby steps. 

“Answered some emails,” Pete says, thinking of the one that Bebe left saying that she thinks their project had run its course. 

“That’s good,” Patrick says quietly, unsure, then, “Have you left the house yet?”

Pete winces at that, which is stupid because Patrick has been in his house. Has smelt the stale air and seen the life fading from Pete’s face. The brightness, the sparkle from being outside, from interaction is gone. 

“Why are you doing this?” Pete says, trying to sound irritated but he just sounds exhausted. 

There’s silence and Pete almost checks to see if Patrick has hung up but then he says, “You know why.”

“Because you feel bad?”

“Pete--”

“Because I’m fucking fine, alright? I don’t need you to check in on me. I don’t need you to show up with food. I’m an adult, I can feed myself.”

“Doesn’t seem like it,” Patrick bites, and there it is. There’s that irritation that Pete remembers. It’s the same tone that Pete used to dread when he went into the studio for Folie. That same tone that repeated over and over in his ears.  _ I don’t care I don’t care I don’t care. _

Pete hangs up and he misses his Sidekick, that was so much more satisfying to hang up on. He tosses his phone and walks a circle around his bed, trying to burn the tingly bubbles that are working their way up from their slumber in his heart, crawling their way up his throat and then he screams. 

Screams and screams because it’s all too much. The back and forth of apathy and anxiety. The weeks of laying in bed and then the hiding in his house because everything outside seems too scary. He doesn’t want his photograph taken. He doesn’t want to be talked to. Doesn’t want to have to answer another question about Fall Out Boy or Patrick. 

Because it’s never going to happen. He’s never going to make music again. He doesn’t want to fucking make music without Patrick anyway. And he’s not--

His phone buzzes and he wants to ignore it. He should ignore it, but he’s never been able to deny Patrick and he answers it without a greeting. 

“Listen to me,” Patrick bites out, “I need you to fucking get help. I’m looking up therapists with your insurance and I’m going to book you some appointments. See what sticks.”

“Patrick--”

“I’m not asking,” Patrick says, but the venom is gone. Instead his voice is just soft and beaten down, like he’s just as bone weary as Pete. 

So Pete nods and whispers, “Ok.”

*

Pete ends up skipping all his therapist appointments to sit at his kitchen table and write. Something he hasn’t done in a long time. At least, it felt like a long time. Sometimes his days feel like they blur by and then others drag on, making time seem obsolete to Pete. 

He’s on the other side of the coin. He’s not sleeping and he’s filling up notebooks left and right, his hand is screaming in pain but he can’t stop the ink from flowing haphazardly onto the lined pages. When he runs out of ink, he gets on his computer and starts filling his blog with some of the worst, whiniest shit he’s ever written but it helps. 

He doesn’t need someone with a degree to tell him that he’s fucked up. He knows. And he doesn’t need another prescription sitting on his nightstand for Patrick to monitor. He doesn’t want anymore pills and he doesn’t want to talk anymore. He just wants to write and he wants Patrick to stop being a dick and sing for him. 

He knew that Patrick would be pissed, but he didn’t expect him to show up in the middle of his tour. He blinks up at him. “Aren’t you supposed to be--”

“Yeah,” Patrick bites out, tossing his keys onto the kitchen table, “So tell me why the fuck I’m here, Pete.”

Pete doesn’t wince, he just lets the anger from Patrick’s eyes settle in his bones, vibrate and ricochet off his organs, waking him up from this bleak slumber. Patrick is still standing in the middle of the kitchen, his chest heaving and his cheeks getting pink. His brow furrowed and his eyes bright. Like they’re ignited with fire. 

And Pete longs to burn. 

He’s not sure who moved first. Pete thinks he must have since he’s not in his chair anymore. He’s pressed against the back of the fridge. But it doesn’t matter who moved first, just that Patrick is  _ kissing _ him. Or maybe Pete is kissing Patrick. All that Pete cares about is that Patrick’s lips, those lips he’s been fantasizing about for all these years, are on his. Moving, teasing, bruising. 

A whimper sneaks out of Patrick’s mouth and Pete swallows it, letting it join Patrick's anger and melt into something sticky and toxic. Pete knows this is a bad idea. He’s had plenty of those. And this is  _ Patrick _ . Too big. This is too big. And Pete is going to fuck this up too. 

But he doesn’t stop. 

Doesn’t stop Patrick’s talented fingers dipping into the waistband of his sweats. He throws his head back, relishing in the delicious bite of his head hitting the refrigerator, the contrast of Patrick’s careful, always careful with him, hands slipping his sweatpants off. And then his soft lips at Pete’s neck pushing hot air against the baby hairs there, humid against his ear. 

Pete tangles his fingers through the grown out bleached hair that he sort of hates but loves at the same time. Patrick’s hands are gripping Pete’s hips, his lips still at his neck, just breathing heavily. Like he’s trying to think this through too. Patrick, always the logical one. The calm, cool, collected one that’s always talked Pete out of doing stupid shit--or at least the one to come up with a plan B and C and D to counteract Pete’s wildness. 

He waits for Patrick to move away from him. Thinks he’s going to straighten up at any moment and pull away, blushing and sputtering about how sorry he is and he doesn’t know what got into him. All before fumbling out the door and hopping back on a plane to whatever city he should be in right now. 

He doesn’t expect Patrick to drop to his knees. 

“What are you…” but Pete can’t even finish his question, not sure if it’s because he fucking knows what Patrick is about to do or if he just doesn’t have the air to finish the sentence. His chest is heaving, pulse thundering in his ears. His fingers are still tangled in Patrick’s white blonde stands, still unsure if he’s holding him here or holding him away. 

Patrick looks up at him, and Pete’s knees nearly buckle. His eyes are wide, pupils blown, and bright. They’re so bright, cutting right through the haze of Pete’s brain. He wants that life back, he wants to see that excitement again. Wants to see the way Patrick’s eyes twinkle under stage lights. They’re close to that now, that same intensity. 

But he’s pausing, regardless of the heat of the moment. The recklessness of this. Of Patrick letting go in this way, something Pete’s never seen him do and if he wasn’t so out of his mind right now he might be worried, might think that there’s something there that needs unpacking. But Patrick pauses, because even in this, he’s still cautious with Pete. 

And Pete could stop this if he wanted. This is Pete’s out. Or more importantly, because Pete knows that all this is going to break down after they come up for air, this is Patrick’s out. Pete could give him this. 

But he’s selfish. He’s fucked up. And this is Patrick. The Patrick he’s wanted since they were kids. 

So he nods. 

And he swears Patrick shudders, his eyelashes flutter as he looks up at him, slowly pulling off Pete’s boxers. He maintains eye contact as he takes Pete in his mouth, and  _ fuck _ , Pete can’t do it. He can’t watch Patrick with his bright eyes and red mouth stretched around him and not fucking come right then and there. 

Patrick is a little sloppy, which is honestly what Pete prefers. He got bored of the hookups that cared too much how they looked blowing him, or how great their “technique” was. Patrick is just moved by desire. Pete can feel it, and can tell by the way his hands are gripping Pete’s hips and how his throat vibrates with genuine moans. Nothing here is for show. This is real. 

He looks down and Patrick’s eyes are closed, like it was too much for him to look as well. His jeans are undone and he’s palming at himself, his cheeks hollowing and that’s all it takes for Pete to choke out a “Trick…” as a warning, before coming when Patrick’s eyes fly open and settle on Pete’s, determined. 

Pete’s knees buckle then and Patrick’s arms circle around his shoulders, holding him to his chest. Pete mouths at Patrick’s neck, clumsily unbuttoning his dress shirt and pulling at that stupid tie that he keeps wearing. Patrick’s hands comb through Pete’s hair, scratching soothingly at his scalp, like he’s still trying to comfort him through this. Pete cups the back of Patrick’s head and leans them back, letting his hand be the cushion between Patrick’s head and the tiled kitchen floor. 

“Pete, Pete, Pete,” Patrick chants breathlessly, pulling him closer. 

Pete’s other hand slides into Patrick’s pants, wrapping his hand around Patrick. He smiles against Patrick’s open mouth, hanging ajar with a gasp ghosting his used lips. “I’ve got you,” he murmurs gently, nipping at his lower lip and stroking him slowly. 

He waits until Patrick’s hips start meeting Pete’s rhythm to work him faster, twisting his wrist at the top of each movement, only to slow down when Patrick’s hips grow more erratic. Just to run a finger up his length and trace around the head of his cock before starting the punishing movements again. It doesn’t take long for Patrick’s incoherent babbles to turn into choked moans and pleas, his hips moving without any clearity, like he’s not even in control of his body anymore. And Pete has to sit up a little to just marvel at the mess that Patrick’s become under his hands. The way that he’s completely stripped of all the careful structure that has made him up since Pete has met him. 

His shirt is still hanging around his arms, his tie loose and tossed over his shoulder. His pants are around his thighs and he’s fucking  _ gone _ . His chest is flushed, arched off the ground, putting more pressure on the hand that’s still protecting Patrick’s head. Pete watches his hips jerk, hears him cry out, feels the way his cock jerks in Pete’s hand and then his hand and Patrick’s stomach is coated. 

Pete leans down and kisses Patrick’s forehead, stroking him gently a few more times to let him ride out the last of the aftershocks jerking though his body. He looks up and sees a kitchen towel hanging from the oven’s handle within arms reach, so he grabs that and cleans them both up the best that he can. He tosses the towel off to the side before chancing a look at Patrick, not wanting this to break and fall into a freakout over what just happened. 

Patrick’s eyes are still closed, his lips still parted but upturned into the sweetest soft smile. Pete can’t help himself as he leans down to kiss the corner of his curved lips. “Hey you,” he murmurs.

Patrick opens his eyes, and they’re soft, the fiery anger cooling down to a molten acceptance. He reaches up to stroke Pete’s cheek, something he’s done plenty of times when Pete’s been worked up or couldn’t sleep, but this feels different. Same, but different in all the ways that matter. “I came in here to yell at you.”

Pete snorts. “I like this better.

Patrick rolls his eyes, but the smile is still stretching his lips.

Patrick stays the night, but he’s gone by the time Pete wakes up the next morning. There’s a moment where he wonders if he imagined it all. The way Patrick just appeared in his kitchen, but the passion was more intense than whatever Pete could have dreamed up. The calmness after wasn’t something that Pete would have thought he needed either. 

They had finally,  _ finally _ , gotten off the kitchen floor after more lazy kisses and lingering touches. But Patrick had sunken back into himself and decided that they both needed to get up to shower, and Pete needed to eat. Pete isn’t sure when Patrick became so obsessed with food, but he has a feeling it’s just the one thing he can control right now. He can’t scrape out all the bad thoughts in Pete’s mind, but he sure as hell can make sure he eats. 

They had showered separately, Pete first so that Patrick could order delivery and answer a few emails, make some calls to do the slight damage control for disappearing in the middle of his tour. When Patrick had come out of the shower, dressed in cozy, oversized lounge wear from Pete’s closet, Pete was ready to lock them in the bedroom and never let Patrick leave him again. 

But that’s what got them into this mess in the first place.

And so, Pete kept his careful distance, not wanting to fuck this up before it even began. He sat on the other end of the couch even though he wanted to be in Patrick’s lap feeding him greasy fries and kissing the milkshake off his lips. Patrick wasn’t touchy, though Pete hadn’t expected him to. 

The only inclination that anything had even happened between the two of them was when Patrick took Pete’s hand once the movie had ended and drug him to the bedroom. He pushed Pete gently on the bed and curled up next to him, laying his head on Pete’s chest. They’ve cuddled before, they lived in a fucking van together--getting up close and personal was sort of inevitable. But the way Patrick looked up at him was different. The way he stroked over his eyes until Pete closed them was different. How he scratched gently at his scalp, humming softly. All different in the way that it felt like Pete was getting wrapped into a safety blanket, warm and cherished. 

Pete hadn’t slept like that in weeks. And he had wanted to wake up next to Patrick and have lazy sex or even just soft orange juice flavored kisses at his kitchen table. He wanted to drive him to the airport and cling to him until his flight got called. Wanted to stand at the gate and watch him disappear again. 

Instead he wakes up to a cold bed with a note on the pillow. 

_ Don’t miss another appointment. _

*

Pete hasn’t seen his son since the divorce. 

“I don’t want to confuse him,” Ashlee had said, and well, she was the mother and Pete knew enough law to know that the courts were never fair towards the fathers in custody battles. His best bet was just to lay low and let Ashlee make the decisions. He knew she wasn’t vindictive and wouldn’t keep Bronx away from Pete, but he didn’t want to give her any reason to change her mind. 

And he could understand not wanting to send Bronx off to a new house where none of his things were there. To have him show up and sit with his broken father. Pete wasn’t really in any shape to be the fun dad that Bronx was always expecting. 

So he settled for FaceTime calls. 

It was always jarring to see him when Ashlee would FaceTime Pete, it seemed like each call aged Bronx another year. He didn’t look like his baby anymore, wasn’t just babbling around anymore. And he knew that Bronx had been walking and talking before Pete and Ashlee split, but that time was such a haze that he sometimes missed the whole “firsts” stage. His first words. His first steps. The first time he said something that showed his personality. That was the most shocking thing to Pete, the thing that kept Pete up at night. How he was missing Bronx shape into his own person and not just a replica of him and Ashlee. 

“He’s going through a dinosaur phase,” Ashlee had explained while Bronx tripped over the intricate names as he held up different plastic dinosaurs to the camera.

And Pete tried to not cry. 

*

_ To: Patrick -- 1:47PM _

_ That therapist smelled like Doritos _

  
  


_ From: Patrick--1:53PM _

_ You like Doritos. _

Pete’s been trying to be good. He’s been going to the appointments that Patrick sets up for him so that he can find a therapist that he’ll actually talk to. He feels guilty, knowing that Patrick has a million and one things to do right now while he’s on tour, while also managing to make  _ more _ music and probably learn a new language. Pete’s not sure how Patrick finds the time to work his brain so much and still get the recommended hours of sleep that keep him from going crazy.

He just wishes that Patrick was here instead of moving from city to city without him. Sitting in his own van when it was supposed to be the four of them. 

“What do you think of Patrick’s solo thing?” He had asked Joe. 

And Joe just shrugged, said some bullshit about it being good that Patrick is making the music that he’s been wanting to. Which really wasn’t what he wanted to hear, so he asked Andy. But Andy was even worse. It was like everyone had matured in the years since their split and Pete had just sunken further into his sullen teenage angst that he never fully worked out. 

So it didn’t help Pete’s jitteriness. Didn’t help him stay calm and not do anything rash when he was sitting at home with nothing to do but think about everything that had fallen apart. He spent an afternoon finally going through the boxes that he had yet to unpack since he moved from his house with Ashlee. It didn’t make sense for her to leave since all of Bronx’s things were there and he had his routine. But it fucking sucked walking into this huge empty house, and Pete hadn’t really done much to make it feel like home since. 

Most of what he had packed away was more clothes and random books or notebooks that he hadn’t dug out as soon as he moved in. There were a lot of Fall Out Boy things though. Shirts that he wore on tour, guitar picks, flyers, that stupid teddy bear that he won for Patrick at that state fair they stumbled upon in the Midwest. 

“You’re the child, not me,” Patrick had said when Pete pulled him over to the skeeball games. 

“Oh come on, you know you want a teddy bear to cuddle with,” Pete says, wiggling his eyebrows in the way that always made Patrick roll his eyes and smile at the same time, shaking his head a little. 

“I want the big blue one,” Patrick said, pointing at the top prize. 

Pete had paid the attendant and tossed a ball up and down in his hand, measuring up the giant teddy bear that was probably bigger than Patrick. “Oh? Challenge accepted.”

And Patrick had laughed at how cocky Pete had been, trying to win that stupid bear. He probably spent enough money to buy five of those bears, but the attendant had taken pity on him and gave him one of the smaller ones. 

Joe had given him shit about it the rest of the time they walked around the fair, but quickly disappeared with Andy to go ride all the sketchy rides. Patrick wasn’t going anywhere near those things, so Pete hung back with him. 

Pete still remembers how fucking adorable Patrick looked walking around under the twinkling fair lights with both his arms wrapped around the teddy bear like it was the prize he had been wanting the whole time. That was the thing that always amazed Pete about Patrick, how he would just take whatever Pete gave him and treat it like it was meant to be treasured. 

At least that’s what Pete had thought at the time. But that was before Patrick had yelled at him in the studio throughout the whole recording process of Folie. Before he had told him that Pete was too concerned with being Pete Wentz instead of a musician. Before all the extra promotion that they had to do since the album wasn’t doing as well as Patrick had wanted. Before all the tension on the bus. 

And now it was just done. 

Pete shoves everything back in the box and carries it out to the side of the curb before pulling out his phone. He’s been trying not to get on social media when he feels like this. He knows from past mistakes that things get bad when he fires out his emotions out there for the world to see. But this isn’t just an emotional rant, this is the truth.

His thumbs are moving across the keyboard of his phone and he’s hitting post before he reads: “I can’t imagine playing in FOB again.”

Which only takes a few minutes for his phone to start buzzing. 

First with Twitter notifications. 

Then texts from Joe and Andy. 

A text from Mikey Way. 

An email from Bob. 

Then finally a call from Patrick. 

He ignores all of them and grabs the teddy bear out of the box before walking back into the house. 

*

Patrick shows up with Thai food when he finishes his tour. 

He doesn’t say anything as he unloads containers of curry and spring rolls. Doesn’t even look at him as he pushes in  _ Terminator _ and hits play on Pete’s television. 

“Are we going to talk about it?” Pete finally asks because the silence is driving him insane and not even Arnold  Schwarzenegger defeating Skynet is going to keep him distracted. 

“Oh,” Patrick says softly, shoving a piece of broccoli in his mouth, “now you want to talk?”

“Trick--”

“You didn’t want to talk the thousand times I called you--”

“--bit of an exaggeration--”

“The  _ weeks _ I spent trying to get a hold of you. I called Joe and Andy--”

“I mean, I wrote a blog post--”

“--and they hadn’t spoken to you either. Oh, yeah, the fucking post--”

“--anything personal--”

“‘FOB will play again without me’!” Patrick yells, making Pete snap his mouth close before he could say anything else. Patrick glared at him, something that Pete hadn’t seen in so long that he almost sobbed in relief because they  _ needed _ this. “What the actual  _ fuck _ ?”

“I didn’t want to speak for the rest of you,” Pete mumbles. 

“As if I would ever be part of Fall Out Boy without  _ you _ . You’re the only reason it started in the first place, and now you want to just leave it behind like all your other bands. I thought we were fucking diff--”

“Excuse me?” Pete barks, his brows pinching together, “If you recall, I had a fucking band before and  _ you _ \--”

“You literally begged my mom to get me to--”

“--wanna be a  _ drummer _ ,” Pete scoffs. 

“I didn’t want this!” Patrick cries out, “I didn’t want this drama! I didn’t want to be the lead and you fucking shoved me up there anyway.”

Pete just blinks at him and throws his spring roll down in the styrofoam container on the coffee table, before getting up. 

Patrick gets up and follows Pete up the stairs. “What are you doing?”

“Oh? You don’t recognize walking out on someone? I learned it from you.”

Pete’s being turned then shoved against the wall, Patrick’s lips bruising against his and  _ yes _ this is what Pete had been needing since Patrick left. He needed this release, and not just sex. He needed to yell. He needed to be pushed and shoved, needed to feel like his body was fucking alive instead catatonic in this tomb of a house. 

Pete pushes Patrick so that his back hits the bedroom door with a light thud. His eyes light up just like they had all those weeks ago in Pete’s kitchen. Pete walks into him, opening the door, and pushing them backwards until Patrick’s thighs hit the bed. Pete hunches down far enough to lift Patrick up in his arms and lay him out on his bed. There’s a moment, looking down at Patrick as he climbs on top, that he wishes he spent the time to get new sheets for his bed. Something blue maybe, dark to contrast against his pale skin. Silky for sure. Patrick deserves silky sheets. 

He’s not wearing his  _ Soul Punk _ attire this time, so it’s easier to get him undressed. Pete sits back on his heels as he pulls the last of Patrick’s clothes off and tosses them to the side. “You’re beautiful,” Pete whispers. 

Patrick blushes and sits up to wrap his arm around Pete’s neck and pull him closer. “Why are you still dressed?”

“Because someone is lazy,” he grins. 

Patrick snorts and pulls Pete’s t-shirt up and off, attaching his mouth to Pete’s bare shoulder as soon as the fabric hits the floor. He licks along the thorns around his neck, hands drifting down to tease at the waistband of his sweats. Pete can’t keep his mouth off Patrick either, he sucks against his neck, hard and up high, possessively marking him for everyone to see.  _ Mine _ . 

“Fuck,” Patrick mutters, rocking against Pete. The sweats that Pete’s wearing leaves hardly any barrier between them, does nothing to conceal the hardness pressing into Patrick. Patrick pushes Pete down and grinds on top of him, one hand pressed against Pete’s chest, with his head bowed forward like he doesn’t have the strength. 

“So beautiful,” Pete repeats breathlessly, slipping his hands to the waistband and shoving down the rest of his clothing since Patrick seems to have gotten distracted. Pete shifts them so that Patrick is on his back again and kisses down his chest, taking the time to swirl his tongue around both nipples, then grins and does it again when he hears Patrick’s shuddery inhale, before taking Patrick’s cock in his hand and licking up it’s length. 

“ _ Fuck _ me,” Patrick groans. 

Pete lifts his head and grins. “Yeah?”

Patrick meets his eyes and nods. “Yeah,  _ yes _ , Pete--”

Pete surges forward and, “Shh,” he murmurs against his lips, sucking on Patrick’s bottom lip, “I’ll take care of you.”

Patrick tangled his fingers in Pete’s hair and kissed him, then again, and again, as if he could drown out all the insecurities. All the anger. All the self pity. The ugliness that keeps threatening to swallow Pete whole. Patrick’s smothering it all. 

Pete fumbles in the nightstand drawer for the lube and condoms that he had bought even when he didn’t have the energy to buy groceries. Some things never changed. 

Pete brings his forehead against Patrick’s as he circles him with a slick finger, holding his breath. Patrick nods and lifts his head to press his lips gently against Pete’s forehead, hot air hitting the spot he kissed as he gasps at Pete’s finger stretching him. He lets Patrick adjust, sliding in and out, before slipping a second finger in, curling them and brushing against his prostate. 

He grins wickedly as Patrick’s hips buck and a strangled moan pulls from his throat. Pete kisses down his check, licks at his jaw, sucks against his adam’s apple as he works his fingers, twisting then adding a third before, “Ready, please, I’m fucking, just fuck.”

Pete closes his eyes as the huskiness of Patrick’s voice rocks though him and goes straight to his dick. “Yeah,” he breathes, opening his eyes again and fumbling with the condom. Patrick tries to help, but Pete bats his hands away before settling between his legs. 

He’d be lying if he said he never fantasized this moment, had thought about it while he got himself off multiple times. But he just never thought this would actually happen, that Patrick would even want him like this. Patrick, who has seen all the ugliness that Pete had to offer--probably more than anyone else in his life, still leans up to kiss him like Pete’s something desired. 

Pete rocks his hips forward slowly, biting down on his lip to keep from embarrassing himself from the whimpers trying to slip out of his lips because  _ holy fuck _ he didn’t think it was ever this good. Can’t remember when he felt just so in tune with someone else’s body. Doesn’t think he’s ever noticed the way someone’s breath on his skin makes his nerves stand on end, that the blunt nails digging into his hips make them snap forward and Pete breathes out a shaky, “Sorry,” and stills so that Patrick can get used to him, but his hands slide down to cup his ass and he murmurs, “move, Pete, please.”

And then Pete is rocking into Patrick and he doesn’t think he could ever stop. Doesn’t think there’s any going back from hearing the soft little gasps coming from Patrick, the claiming way he squeezes Pete’s ass, the flutter of his eyes because it’s too much, too much.

But that’s what Pete wants. 

“Look at me,” he breathes, slowing down to the maddening rhythm that Patrick had whined about. 

Patrick’s eyes open and he holds his gaze, his mouth parted and raw from the bruising kisses from earlier, his hair damp against his forehead. 

_ I love you. I have always loved you. _

But he doesn’t say that, Pete just brushes their lips together and hopes that Patrick hasn’t lost his ability to read Pete’s heart. 

*

Pete ends up finding a therapist that he actually likes.

She doesn’t let him get away with any bullshit, which was something that really pissed Pete off during the session. He didn’t like that she kept interrupting his poetic ways of trying to explain his feelings and made him reword what he was saying so it was coming from Pete and not Pete Wentz. He had wanted to walk out multiple times, but by the time she told him their session was done, he actually was upset it was over. 

There was something cathartic with fighting with himself. Something freeing about breaking down his own barriers so he could see what mess was behind them. 

And when Patrick had called from his condo in Chicago to ask how it went, Pete mumbled, “I’m exhausted.”

Patrick chuckled, “That means it’s working.”

Pete’s not entirely sure about that. He’s got new medication, which he really fought tooth and nail about. It wasn’t that he was opposed to medicine for mental illnesses, he’s not a dick. It’s just hard to take pills after his bad relationship with them. 

It was something that he never really talked about, even with Patrick. They usually avoided talking about the Best Buy incident like the plague. When it happened, Patrick had shown up at his parent’s house with wide eyes and took Pete into his arms, cradled the back of his head and hissed, “Don’t you ever do that to me again.”

And that had been it. 

Pete thinks about that night when Patrick cleared out his misused prescription pills, and he didn’t say anything about them either. Just removed them from temptation. Because Pete might talk a lot and he might reveal really personal things, but Patrick knows his limits. 

Even when Pete had been in the thick of his prescription abuse, Patrick never lectured him. None of the guys did, but he had sorta expected it from Patrick. The only time he had said anything was when he wrapped his hand around the back of Pete’s neck that one time they were in Berlin and whispered against his ear, “cool it.” 

Pete knows he’s a lot to deal with, and it’s unfair to unload it all on Patrick. But Patrick always took it without complaints, well, maybe with an eyeroll here and there, but never packed him up like his parents, and now Ashlee, had. At least that was  _ before _ .

But he’s here, Pete keeps reminding himself. The hiatus...it wasn’t Patrick sending him away because he’s  _ here _ . It’s just hard to remember that when Patrick is off in another state. 

“Move to LA,” Pete murmured against the phone one night, pretending Patrick is in bed next to him. 

“Move back to Chicago,” Patrick countered. 

Sometimes Pete thinks about it. Thinks about showing back on his parent’s doorstep but he’s in his thirties now and that would just be a tad bit depressing. 

“Can’t,” Pete had said, “It’s part of the custody agreement with Bronx.”

But along with the new medication also came little exercises. Like setting alarms on his phone so that he could mimic a normal day with a routine instead of staying in bed for two days straight then sitting up writing for another two. And it’s really weird at first. He has to call Patrick a lot to feel like he’s not flailing out into the universe. 

And there’s other things she wants him to do, like talk to Patrick about what’s been going on with them. Because apparently having sex and not talking about their feelings is bad. But Pete’s just been letting Patrick take the lead on this, because he trusts him to know what he’s doing. Pete is the fucked up one, he can’t be trusted, but Patrick wouldn’t let them crumble. 

Except Patrick sorta keeps acting like the sex didn’t happen. And maybe Pete is acting the same way and his therapist’s “this is why we communicate” always comes in mind when he thinks too long about the whole ordeal he’s created. But it’s not something that he knows how to bring up. Because Patrick is walking around like everything is perfectly fine, so it must be right?

It almost comes out though, when he’s laying his head down on Patrick’s still cooling chest. He runs his fingers up and down Patrick’s stomach, trying to find the Patrick he knows in this body. It’s still him, but it’s not and it’s sorta fucking with Pete. And it’s not like he didn’t know that Patrick had to lose the weight for his health, the weight isn’t really the issue at all. Patrick just  _ feels _ different when he holds him. Pete’s not sure if that’s just because now sex is involved and Pete always gets more attached, if that was even possible. He doesn’t think that’s it though. Patrick seems more fragile to him, like he’s been under so much pressure that his bones are going to shatter at any minute. 

Pete rests his chin on Patrick’s chest and looks up at him. 

“What?” Patrick asks, eyebrow raised. 

_ You’d tell me if something was wrong, right? _

But instead he just says, “Nothing.”

*

“Why are we here again?” 

Patrick dips his spoon into his frozen yogurt and walks over to the glass that is separating them from the thousands of fish and gallons of water. “You needed to get out of the house. It’s been months.”

“I go to therapy,” Pete counters, “And the grocery store.”

Patrick smiles at him, like he’s proud of him. “Yeah, I know, and that’s good. But you haven’t left to do anything  _ fun _ .”

Pete smirks at him and walks over to stand next to him. “Who says I’m having fun now?”

Patrick shoves a spoonful of strawberry frozen yogurt into Pete’s mouth. “You’re like a child. The aquarium and frozen yogurt is guaranteed fun for you.”

“Not true,” he says, dipping the spoon back into Patrick’s yogurt. “I don’t even like fish. Their eyes freak me out.”

“You had a fish tank that rivaled a Bond’s villain,” Patrick reminds him. 

“That was for Bronx.”

“Who was an infant, try again.”

“Whatever,” Pete mumbles, stealing more yogurt. 

It had been nice to get outside today. Patrick even rolled down all the windows so that the wind would kiss Pete’s cheeks as they drove down the highway. And when they got out of the car, Pete sort of hovered in the parking lot just so he could feel the sun lick up his skin like a lover he had been away from for too long. And if Patrick noticed, he didn’t say anything. 

“You’re more smiley,” Patrick says with a grin, leading him into the next room that had the sharks. 

Pete stood up to the glass and watched their reflections mirror back at him. He didn’t know how to tell Patrick that the smiles had nothing to do with the fish and frozen treats, but because Patrick had been coming over more again, giving in and looking at ads to rent a condo in LA again even though, “this is stupid, I don’t need two homes” he grumbled when he flopped on Pete’s couch, “It’s why I sold my condo here before I left for tour.”

“Move in here,” Pete had said without thinking. 

“What?” Patrick replied, setting his phone down with a frown. 

“You’re here anyway,” Pete had replied with a shrug, like he was trying to downplay it, “And sell your Chicago condo.”

“I’m not leaving Chicago.”

Pete rolled his eyes, “Of course not. Fine, but don’t get another place. When you’re in LA, just stay here like you’ve been doing.”

Patrick had been silent for a moment, looking at Pete with consideration, then, “Won’t that be weird?”

Pete pretended he didn’t know what he meant. “We’ve lived together before.”

“We weren’t sleeping together then.”

“We’ve slept together--”

“Pete.”

“Yeah, ok,” Pete grumbled, getting up and going into the kitchen to get a glass of water he didn’t need.

“What’s with you and walking away all of a sudden? That’s twice now,” Patrick sighed when he got to the kitchen as well, leaning up against the doorframe. 

“Well you know what happened last time…” Pete trailed off suggestively, filling a glass at the sink. 

“Pete,” Patrick sighed, getting more frustrated and Pete knew that he was pushing it. 

“I didn’t think you wanted to talk about it,” Pete gave in, leaning back against the sink with the water in both of his hands. 

Patrick frowned. “About what?”

Pete felt his face pinch up in confusion. He had never been great at these games, these silly try-not-to-show-you-care-more-than-the-other-person kind of games. The one he played all during Summer of Like with Mikey Way when he knew he was just a fling to him but he kept seeking more anyway. And he really didn’t want to play this with Patrick, because he always lost. And losing Patrick was something he wasn’t ready to do, doesn’t think he’d ever be able to do. 

“Pete?”

“Nothing.”

“No, not nothing, don’t...fuck, you never shut me out before.”

“That was before you shut me out first.”

“You really want to go there?”   


“You walked out!”

“It was mutual!”   
  
“To  _ who _ ? Me? I didn’t--”

“Joe--”

“Because you’re so fucking controlling!” Pete yelled, “You wouldn’t let him have any say in that fucking album all because of this  _ dream _ . Face it, you wanted a solo career for a while and now you finally got it so  _ stop _ pretending you leaving had anything to do with the rest of us!”

Patrick had this wild expression on his face that Pete hadn’t seen since they were working on Folie. That  _ I can’t believe you went there _ look on his face. The one that he used to pull out of Patrick on the regular, but they had been careful with each other recently. Pete had been good. He had been trying to not be clingy. Had been trying not to say things without really considering how Patrick would take it. But he just--

“I’m sorry.”

Pete blinked. “What?”

Patrick looked like he had been ready to cry and turned his head like he could hide it now. “I’m sorry,” he had repeated and Pete didn’t ask for anything else, he just closed the distance and pulled him into his arms. 

And he didn’t say it was ok, because it wasn’t. And he didn’t say he forgave him, because Pete would always forgive Patrick. He just held him and pretended that the crack in their carefully duct taped foundation hadn’t just rocked their already shaky relationship. Or whatever this was.

But Patrick left the next morning and came back two days later with duffel bags in his hands with a soft, shy smile. The same smile that had greeted him all those years ago. 

*

Pete had been granted joint custody, which is what he and Ashlee had agreed on in the beginning, but there was always that fear that slithered into his mind late at night that she would think he wasn’t a good enough father to be around Bronx on his own. 

He had held his tongue when he wanted to tell her, “I’m not alone.”

But that means he’s standing in the middle of the hardware store trying to pick out paint for Bronx’s room because he doesn’t want him to have to sleep in a bare beige room. 

“It’s probably time you make your house your home,” his therapist had said when he brought it all up. And she spewed a bunch of crap about Pete not unpacking or painting because he was still thinking that this was temporary. Which made sense somewhat. But things were starting to feel more permanent with Patrick unpacking his bag of clothes into Pete’s closet, and maybe that’s why Pete finally finished going through the boxes.

“Is green too masculine?” He asks Patrick on FaceTime, showing him the paint swatches he has in his hands. 

“Too masculine?” Patrick asks, with Target clearly in the background. Pete can hear the intercom leaking through the speaker of his phone. 

“Yeah, I don’t want him to think he can’t like pink,” Pete says, then sighs, “I really like this hot pink color, but I don’t want to be pushy either.”

Patrick snorts. “You’re not painting your son’s room hot pink.”

“That’s a bit sexist of you, Trick.”

“I’m not saying because he’s a boy. I’m saying you’re not painting the room hot pink because that’s such a loud color for a bedroom. You need something soothing, like, let me look at those greens again.”

“I think you’ve been watching too much HGTV,” Pete says with a fond smile, then, “What are you doing at Target?”

Patrick’s face twists in that exasperated but fond expression, that  _ oh, Pete _ , that Pete has grown so accustomed to. “We can’t keep using the same two towels that you managed to pack. Seriously, Ashlee sent you with only two towels? She should know better than think you would go shopping for household things. You know you didn’t have a trash can in your bathroom either? Where do you put your floss?”

“In the toilet?”

Patrick is putting something in his shopping cart then strolling down the aisle. “So bad for the environment…” he mumbles, then looks at the screen. “I like that green. The sage color?”

Pete frowns at the paint swatch, eyeing the one at top that’s darker. “What about the forest color?”

“Too dark. Unless you put some white furniture in there. But white with a toddler probably isn’t a great idea.”

Pete looks between the two colors then sighs and goes to the counter to order the sage green paint. “Yeah, ok, you win.”

Patrick grins. “Don’t I always?”

And it feels so much like they’re a couple. Pete has to keep reminding himself that they’re just Pete and Patrick, with sex thrown in the mix. But Pete’s not really sure what Pete and Patrick really is anymore, what it has been all these years. He’s more than a bandmate, that’s for sure. None of them were just bandmates, he thought of Joe and Andy as brothers and he always told interviewers that the band was more of a family than just a job. But Patrick was still more than that. Patrick was his best friend, but more than that too. And fuck buddy doesn’t sound right. Even if they  _ were _ dating, he’s not sure ‘boyfriend’ would hold the sentiment either. 

Pete’s written thousands of words, and he’s not sure he knows one to define Patrick to him. 

“Oh, can you get those little sticky hook things?” Patrick cuts in, “The ones that don’t ruin the wall? I wanted to hang up some photos.”

Pete smiles softly. “Sure.”

Heart full, and even fuller house, Patrick is starting to make a home for him. He’s always felt like his safe haven, there had been countless times where Pete was itching to go on tour, and not just to get back on stage, but to be around Patrick twenty-four-seven. He wanted to drape his limbs over him after a show, Patrick still riding the stage high to push him off. Loved slipping into Patrick’s bunk to curl up behind his back and try not to smile too hard when Patrick would turn and pull his blanket over Pete as well, pulling him into the warmth. Even the small things like Patrick stealing fries off his plate in southern dinners or putting a beanie over Pete’s head when they were playing an outdoor show in the north. Patrick has always felt like home. 

When he pulls up to the house he shakes his head at Patrick’s car parked in the driveway, the trunk open with bags still needing to be carried in. Pete shuffles the bags up his arms then picks up the buckets of paint and goes inside. Patrick is walking back to the door. “Oh, is that it?”

Pete nods. “What did you do, buy the rest of the store?”

Patrick just rolls his eyes and goes to the bags that are sitting on the couch. “It’s not my fault you hardly have anything here. Oh, I got us those little drawer divider things so you stop stealing my socks.”

“Your socks? Babe, have you  _ seen _ my sock collection?” He says, then freezes when he realizes what slipped out of his mouth without his permission. 

Patrick tenses a little, but he just keeps digging things out of the plastic shopping bags. 

“I mean,” Pete continues, “Why would I want your plain white socks when my socks have surfing sloths?”

Patrick smiles a little, and Pete thinks the crisis has been averted. But it’s already there, hanging in the air. A sign that there’s still things they haven’t talked about. Like the fact that Patrick is buying things for Pete’s house like he’s planning on staying, that this isn’t something temporary. And Pete’s not sure when he’s going to trust Patrick not to leave again, but it’s there. The uncertainty of where they stand. Of what the fuck they’re doing. 

Because this is Pete and Patrick. But not with Fall Out Boy. And while Patrick has always been his home, Fall Out Boy was the neighborhood, it was where their home was and without that, they were just standing on that faulty, duct taped foundation in a wasteland. 

Later, Pete’s in Bronx’s room, painting a spot on the wall before stepping back to look at it and, fuck, yeah that green does look pretty good when Patrick comes in with another bag. Pete grins and looks at him with a raised eyebrow.

“So I got him some stuff for his bed. Sheets, blankets, pillow cases, that sort of stuff,” he says pulling them out. Pete’s eyes water a little when he sees the little dinosaurs patterned over the fabric. “He’s still into dinosaurs, right?”

Pete pulls Patrick into his arms, burying his face into the side of his neck and squeezing hard, like if he hugs Patrick enough the tightness in his throat and the sting in his eyes will go away. He’s happy. So fucking happy, and torn up at the same time. Because he can’t fucking do this, Patrick can’t buy things for his kid if he’s not staying. 

But Patrick doesn’t push him away.

He hugs him closer. 

*

And things are really good for a while. 

Pete has gotten to the point where he doesn’t need his little alarms to get out of bed or to know when it’s time to eat lunch. Patrick is there to pull him through the day, making sure he eats something before he takes his medication, taking him outside to walk around the block, pushing his bass into his hands again. 

He tries to make sure he’s doing the right thing. He goes to his therapy sessions and actually talks to her about things without the flowery language he tries to hide behind. He doesn’t talk about Fall Out Boy online anymore, doesn’t really say much of anything online. He sits in the living room with his fingers strumming over bass strings again. Small things that mean something big to Patrick. Because he sees Patrick’s soft, careful smile shift into blinding grins, like he’s  _ proud _ . 

But then Patrick starts frowning whenever he looks at his phone. Because his album is tanking and he’s lost so much money to make it, and keeps losing money. So it doesn’t really surprise Pete when Patrick tells him he’s going to hop on Panic’s tour with them. 

“That’s…” Pete starts, because he doesn’t want to know what it feels like to have Patrick leave again. Especially with him all over his house now. It was easier to push him out of his head when he didn’t see his fucking toothbrush next to his. And there’s nothing keeping Patrick here, no commitment. He still has his fucking Chicago condo that he can go back to. All that’s here is a few duffel bags worth of personal belongings and a fucking toothbrush. “Great,” he finishes, because he’s trying to be good. 

Patrick arches his eyebrow at Pete and shifts so that he’s straddling Pete on their--no, just  _ his _ \--bed. It’s late, much later that Patrick likes to stay up, but he hasn’t been able to escape the emails from disappointed label reps to go to sleep. 

Patrick dips his head down to brush his lips against Pete’s. “It’s just a month,” he murmurs like he can read his thoughts. And Pete feels that bubbling panic rising up his throat, that panic that always makes him act out and make Patrick mad at him. But he’s been trying. He’s been trying to be good. He just wants to be good for Patrick.

“Shh,” Patrick murmurs, rocking against him, “You  _ are _ good.”

Pete hadn’t realized he was saying any of that out loud, but Patrick is stroking his cheeks whispering, “So good, baby,” and Pete’s eyes roll into the back of his head. Patrick doesn’t let up, keeps whispering how Pete is the best thing in his life, how Pete is beautiful, talented, smart,  _ good _ . All while undressing him and pressing his heavy loaded words into Pete’s trembling skin with gentle kisses, to soothe the blow. Because sometimes kindness hurts more than the rolled eyes, the frustrated sighs, and the ignored phone calls. 

Patrick takes his time to stroke Pete open for him and Pete’s never felt more vulnerable before in his life. Even in front of Mikey Way in his haze of fucked upness, not in front of Ashlee who’s seen how bad things can get, not like this. Pete’s never felt as stripped as he does right now under Patrick. And he should be scared, he should know better from all the others who have broken down Pete just to leave him bleeding from his heart, but he’s not scared. He’s not scared of Patrick, not as he fucks him slowly, keeping their eyes locked and Pete sees it there. Sees how Patrick isn’t going to take advantage of this relationship they’ve created. This messiness, this uncertainty. 

Patrick sits them up, Pete in his lap with his knees on either side of Patrick’s thighs, moving over him. Patrick presses his face into Pete’s chest, kisses over his heart. “Tell me,” he demands shakily as their limbs start to tremble in those telltale signs of being swept under, “Pete.”

Pete makes a few more passes over Patrick’s lap, before he grips his hair and hangs on as his orgasm comes trampling over him mercilessly. 

“Good,” he gasps, as he starts to come down, slipping into Patrick’s arms, “So good.”

*

Pete is putting together the dresser for Bronx’s room when he gets the notification. 

_ We Liked You Better Fat: Confessions of a Pariah _

He blinks at his screen and double checks to make sure it really has Patrick’s name as the author because that’s not like him at all. Pete was the one that made the overdramatic posts online. But then he reads it, and it fucking hurts. 

Because it sounds like Patrick. It sounds like that insecure seventeen year old he bought a hat for so he didn’t have to look out into the audience and the angry twenty-six year old that he’s come to love all in one. And it hurts. Because he didn’t know that his Patrick was hurting like this. He knew that Patrick was hard on himself, he’s always been like that. And maybe that’s why Pete lets him get all frustrated and grumpy in the studio, because he’s always chasing what Corktree was for everyone else. Even though it wasn’t even  _ his _ type of music. Patrick hated the genre they were in, and he always tried to push everything they created just a little bit outside the box they had been placed in. It seemed like with each album, Patrick got more and more restless. Pete always knew that Patrick was bigger than him, bigger than the band. 

And maybe that’s why this hurts so much. Because here he is, doing the music that he’s been wanting to do for so long and people are just fucking trashing him for it. And Pete knows how much Patrick hates Folie, but Pete will always have some sort of soft spot for that album. Still has to turn away from Patrick when he sings What a Catch, Donnie, because that’s Patrick’s song and watching him sing that, to say the words that Pete pulled from all of their conversations over the millions of miles they’ve traveled together, it’s always too much. That album meant the world to Pete because they worked the hardest on it, Pete screamed and cried for the album, and he wrote Patrick that song as an apology. As a plea to not walk away from this band.  _ Look! _ He was shouting through the lyrics,  _ look at all we’ve done.  _

Pete can’t even keep reading because his vision is blurred and hot, so he just gets off the floor of his son’s room and goes to grab the teddy bear that he had hidden before pocketing his keys and walking out the house. 

He’s getting on a plane before he realizes this is when the anxiety is supposed to hit him, but he just sits in his seat and hugs the teddy bear tightly as they take off the runway. He keeps his eyes shut the entire four and a half hours it takes him to land in his hometown. He hurries through the airport, glad he didn’t pack a bag so he didn’t have to wait at baggage claim. He hates coming back to Chicago, there’s always a frenzy that shakes him into slipping a Xanax under his tongue. But not this time,  _ he’s not doing that anymore _ , he reminds himself as he works through his breathing exercises while he waits for his Uber to pull up. 

Patrick’s condo is dark when he slips his key in and he wonders if maybe he really should have called, but then he sees Patrick’s frail figure in the shadows of his kitchen, pouring amber liquid into a short glass. From the way that Patrick is slumped, it doesn’t look like it’s his first. 

Pete closes the door behind him softly, and only hesitates when Patrick looks up at him like he’s unsure why Pete is standing here in front of him. As if he would be anywhere else, and for a minute Pete wonders if this isn't what Patrick wants at all. If he’s only able to let Pete be the broken one. That Pete is just another puzzle to keep Patrick’s mind busy before he finds something else to stimulate him. 

But then his eyes fall onto the teddy bear that Pete is holding limply in his hand, almost dragging it on the floor as he walks over to Patrick. He circles around him, putting the bear in Patrick’s hands before wrapping his arms around him and squeezing tight enough to remind Patrick that Pete can pick up the pieces too. 

“I’m here,” he whispers against his ear.

And that’s all it takes for Patrick to shatter. 

Pete should have known that there was something wrong when Patrick barely texted him all month long. And Pete gave him some slack because he didn’t want to chase Patrick away with his clinginess and they had left things on a more solid ground--more solid than Pete had felt about the state of things in a while. 

“I’m not--it’s not going to be like that again,” Patrick had whispered, stroking Pete’s cheek, “I wasn’t leaving, I just needed a break.”

And Pete didn’t really know if that hurt more or less, but he took it and drove Patrick to the airport the next morning. 

“Alright,” Pete says now, taking the glass of Scotch, “Why don’t you give me that and we get you into the shower?” 

Patrick doesn’t fight him, just hangs onto Pete as he lifts him up and carries him into Patrick’s small bathroom. Pete is a little surprised at how much he misses his house in LA, only because Patrick had stuck a polaroid he found of them at some bar off the coast up on the mirror. He sets him down on the closed toilet lid and starts the shower, adjusting the temperature, then he turns to start to undress Patrick. 

But Patrick curls into himself when Pete gets his shirt off, something he hasn’t done in years when the weight bothered him. Pete frowns and kneels down. “Hey,” he says softly, tugging at Patrick’s arms.

“I don’t even know anymore,” Patrick slurs a little, and his voice sounds raspy from the alcohol and tears. 

“Know what?” Pete asks, working on getting Patrick’s jeans undone. 

“Me.”

Pete frowns but decides they’ll unpack all of that after he gets Patrick to sober up a bit. There’s no point in having a conversation with him while he’s drunk. Years of drinking with Patrick has taught Pete that Patrick never remembers anything when he’s drinking, doesn’t matter if he’s been doing shots all night or just had a few beers. It’s like his brain completely turns off as soon as a drop of alcohol is in his system. 

“Alright, lunchbox, stand up,” Pete says, patting his hip.

Patrick stumbles a bit, but stands with his arms around Pete’s neck. 

“I’ve got you,” Pete repeats softly, because he thinks Patrick needs that drilled into his brain. And he’ll tell him again later when they’ve finally had the talk that they’ve been skirting around for months. Because Patrick left before, it makes sense for Pete to think that he’ll leave again. But he never thought of how insecure Patrick still is, and Pete should know that there’s just some things you never grow out of. Patrick hanging limply onto his neck makes him feel like he’s slipping that trucker hat on Patrick’s head before their first show again. Makes him feel like he’s in that small bathroom in Paris, giving him a pep talk so that he can build up the courage to talk to that girl he had been staring at all night. Or when he held his hand as they heard Sugar for the first time on the radio, squeezing hard like he was telling him  _ I told you _ . 

Patrick doesn’t want Pete to stay while he showers, so he goes out into the main room and immediately feels transported to when Patrick came over to clean up Pete’s place after his divorce. He sighs and picks up the empty take out containers on the coffee table, dumps the bottles of alcohol--something he’ll get an ear for--down the drain, opens the blinds and lights the stupid pumpkin spice candle that he has sitting out. 

When Patrick emerges, he’s pink and splotchy from the hot water and from more tears. But he doesn’t smell like a distillery anymore and he looks a little bit better in his pajamas than the wrinkled dress shirt and jeans. Pete doesn’t make him talk yet, just sprawls out on the couch with him as they watch all of the  _ Back to the Future _ movies and Pete orders him chicken vindaloo from his favorite restaurant. 

He doesn’t even make Patrick move to the bedroom when they finish the last movie and Patrick has drifted to sleep with his head on Pete’s chest. Pete just leans back against the arm of the couch and accepts the fact that he’s going to have a stiff neck in the morning as he closes his own eyes, falling asleep easier than he has since Patrick left for tour. 

When he wakes in the morning Patrick isn’t on him anymore, he’s banging around in the kitchen. Pete sighs and answers a few texts from his mom--leaving out that he’s in Chicago, Ashlee to let her know he’ll be out of town for a few days, and Andy and Joe to let them know that he’s with Patrick and everything is going to be fine. 

When he makes it to the kitchen Patrick is cracking eggs over a skillet. Pete goes into the fridge and finds a bottle of orange juice and unscrews the cap, taking a drink. 

“I hate it when you do that. I have glasses here.”

“I think we should pack them up and bring them home,” Pete replies. 

“I bought you glasses, they’re in the cabinet above the dishwasher,” Patrick says with a frown, and Pete laughs a little, shaking his head. 

“I meant you should move in,” Pete says, “For real.”

Patrick turns off the stove and moves the half cooked eggs to the side and leans back against the kitchen counter, crossing his arms. 

_ Fuck. _

“Seriously?” Patrick says cooly, which Pete knows from that tone of voice, he should get ready to start dodging items. 

“I can’t move here,” Pete says slowly, like Patrick is a wild animal--which he sorta is when he gets like this. “Bronx--”

“What gives you the right to ask me to just  _ move _ in with you?” Patrick demands, “When is it going to be enough for you?”

Pete furrows his brow, because this is not what he had been expecting. He thought asking him to move in for real would be romantic and Patrick would get swept away. That he would see that he should move in with him, leave behind this place that they’ve outgrown so that Pete can take care of Patrick the way he’s been neglecting to. Wants him to see that this condo where Patrick slept alone and wrote songs without Pete was only going to drag them back under when Pete had finally just gotten his head above water. 

“I just thought--”

“What? That I needed you to show up and...I’m not the broken one, Pete,  _ you _ are! You’ve been the one that I picked up for all these years. You never gave me time to fall apart.”

“You can now,” Pete whispers, making sure he’s filtering all of Patrick’s words through the screen he’s built in his mind for these conversations. He knows by now that there’s always a hidden meaning behind the sting.

Patrick scoffs and runs his hand through his hair that’s standing up all over the place from it air drying last night. His roots are coming in, and Pete can see his Patrick starting to poke through this character that Patrick has been wearing on stage for the past year. “What?” He demands when Pete still hasn’t backed down or retreated with his tail between his legs.    
“Come home with me.”

Fire ignites back in Patrick’s eyes. “ _ This _ is my home,” he says, throwing his hands up, “I live here. I never abandoned Chicago--”

Pete laughs. 

“What? You think it’s funny? That this is  _ all _ I have!”

“It’s not all you have,” Pete says softly, taking a step towards him. 

Patrick’s eyes grow more wild. “What? What do I have left? All my money is tied up in this stupid failed record!”

“Then make another.”

“With  _ what _ ?”

“I’ll pay for it.”

“That’s not…” Patrick huffs, then looks down at the floor, “I don’t have anything left to make. Twenty-seven and I’m already a has-been.”

“You’re not a has been,” Pete says, still in that slow, quiet voice that he’s adopted in using for Patrick. He takes another step forward. “You’re so talented, Trick, you’re nowhere near done yet.”

Another step. 

“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore,” he whispers, like it’s embarrassing for him to admit. And it makes Pete think of those nights in the studio watching Patrick make something out of nothing like he was magic. He wasn’t a parlor trick; this failed album was nothing, just a blimp on the mountains of successes that Patrick’s had and will still have. There wasn’t faking the kind of magic that Patrick had. Pete’s been around enough bands and musicians to know that Patrick was the real deal, the true blue magic. 

“You’re going to brush this off and make more music,” Pete says, taking another step, and he’s close enough to take Patrick’s shaky hands in his. He brings them up to his lips and kisses those talented fingers, “You’re going to make more music with me.”

“Pete--”

“And we’re just going to see what happens,” Pete says gently before Patrick can talk himself out of this, “We’re just going to write and it’s going to be cathartic and what we both need.”

Patrick looks at him doubtfully, so Pete leans in and kisses him, slow because he hasn’t kissed him without pushing them towards sex. Pete cups Patrick’s chin and kisses him sweetly, just enough pressure to shake Patrick out of his shell.

“And then move in with me,” Pete murmurs. 

Patrick snorts and leans his forehead against Pete’s. “Anyone ever told you that you push too much?”

“Maybe once or twice,” Pete grins. 

*

And so they write. 

Patrick takes Pete to where he wrote  _ Soul Punk _ because all his stuff was still there and they spend hours fucking around for a bit and then a few more hours trying to be serious, but nothing happens. And Pete has a fleeting fear that maybe he had been wrong--not about Patrick, but maybe the  _ two _ of them don’t work anymore. 

But it feels so much like old times that Pete feels giddy after they leave I.V. Lab Studio with his hand close enough to Patrick’s that he could slip their fingers together and it seem like an accident. Patrick looks disappointed that nothing tangible came out of the session, but he can tell by the lack of tension in his shoulders that he got something out of it as well. 

Enough that Pete calls to get his prescription filled at a local pharmacy since he didn’t grab anything before he hopped on a plane. Patrick shakes his head fondly, but there’s a proud smile on his lips.

And they go back to the studio the next day, after the best lazy morning sex that Pete’s sure he’s ever had. And Pete fiddles around with some lyrics, something new because he doesn’t want to dig into the past--not yet. He wants to see if they’re even able to move forward before they start examining the last few years.

Patrick is mixing something that sounds like a mix between  _ Soul Punk _ and Fall Out Boy, something a little bouncy and Pete adds a fun bassline that he was only joking about but Patrick’s eyes light up and he nods at Pete like he’s done something right. And Pete’s never going to get tired of stumbling on the right things for Patrick. 

Pete writes lyrics, lyrics that he hasn’t felt compelled to really focus on. He writes: _You and me are the difference between real love and the love on TV_ and then buries it under lyrics that could be shoved into a club single. And he blushes when Patrick quirks an eyebrow, but he sings that line and it rattles round and round in Pete’s mind. 

Round and round as he sits at the kitchen table later that night pretending to eat instead of listening to Patrick on the phone with Joe. Telling him that things will be different this time. 

Round and round as he sends a text to Andy. Pleading with him to put his project on hold to just meet up with them. 

Round and round as they both write the email to Bob. 

*

And then there’s a period of time where the panic sets in. 

Where Patrick is still in Chicago packing up his condo because he finally agrees to just move into Pete’s house but “only because I’m fucking broke” and Pete grins, because it doesn’t matter why he’s moving in, just that he is. 

Where Bronx comes over for the first time and plays with Pete in his bedroom with all the dinosaurs that Patrick had bought the last time they made a trip to Target. And Pete has to call Patrick that night and have him walk through his breathing exercises while Bronx sleeps in his bed for the first time and Pete is alone in the house with him. 

“What if he smothers himself in the pillows. I told you that you bought too many pillows.”

Patrick sighs, “There’s not too many pillows.”

“Or what if he falls off the bed and hits his head then gets a concussion and dies.”

“Pete--”

“Or what if--”

“Pete!”

Pete swallows but he can’t breathe, so the lump gets stuck in the middle of his throat and when he tries to clear it, it sounds like a sob. 

“Pete,” Patrick murmurs, “Just breathe. In for four counts, yeah?”

Pete breathes in and holds it for the four slow beats that Patrick counts out on the phone, before releasing it slowly. “Again.”

They do it for four more times before Pete feels the adrenaline of the day hit him like a train and he’s slumped on the couch. 

And Pete’s jittery again, to the point that his therapist changes his dosage and has him come in an extra day a week for a few weeks. It’s hard because Patrick is sort of dragging his feet with the condo, and Pete understands. It was a sense of independence for Patrick. He was always part of Fall Out Boy and that condo was some sort of symbol of his time as a solo artist, even though it wasn’t the best memory, he knows that Patrick was still proud of himself for doing it in the first place.

But it still sucks when he comes home to an empty house after taking Bronx back to Ashlee’s. And he keeps replaying Patrick’s, “I’ll be home soon”, focusing on the fact that he referred to the house he’s standing in as  _ home _ . 

It doesn’t stop him from being Pete though. From him posting erratically online again, nothing horribly awful, but enough to make him cringe the next morning. Doesn’t stop him from second guessing everything, because now the pressure is building up. Andy and Joe are putting aside their successful projects to give this band another shot. He’s got Patrick geared up again when he was the one that wanted the end--break--in the first place.

And when he gets panicky, he sends lyrics to Patrick. 

_ To: Patrick--2:16AM _

_ Letting people down is my thing baby _

_ Find yourself a new gig _

Pete waits about ten minutes to reread what he wrote and goes, “Fuck.”

_ To: Patrick--2:24AM _

_ Those were lyrics. _

  
  


_ From: Patrick--2:31AM _

_ Go to sleep. _

  
  


_ From: Patrick--2:31AM _

_ I’ll be home tomorrow. _

*

Patrick is sitting on the couch with his laptop,  _ The Goonies _ playing on mute in the background. Pete is supposed to be journaling for his therapist but he can’t focus on anything enough to write it, it’s like all these thoughts are coming into his brain long enough to tighten his chest then leave before he can process what just happened. 

“I wrote something a while ago,” Patrick says.

Pete sets down his notebook and turns to him so he has his full attention. Patrick looks at his laptop a little hesitantly. “I wrote it when I was working on my album, but it sounded like Fall Out Boy so I just saved it.”

Which sort of throws Pete off a little because he had been under the impression that everyone sort of thought there wasn’t going to be Fall Out Boy again. Andy and Joe had moved on and Patrick went off to do his thing. Pete had to set it in his mind that they were done as a band. So the fact that Patrick had songs for Fall Out Boy, fucks him up a bit. 

“What?” Patrick asks. 

“I didn’t think you…” then Pete tries again, “I thought hiatus meant end for you.”

Patrick frowns. “No, hiatus means hiatus. Pete, I told you, I just need--”

“You needed a break, yeah I get it,” Pete says, “But I was there when--”

“--will finally trust me again--”

“--look in your eye--”

\--sound like I’m a crazy person--”

“Well you kinda are and--”

“-- _ me _ crazy, have you met--”

“--and you said that I--”

“--know what I said, I said it!” Patrick yells, “Christ, when are you going to start moving forward? How is this band going to work if you keep bringing up shit that went wrong?”

“Because I don’t know where we stand!” Pete yells back, getting off the couch. 

“No,” Patrick says, getting up as well, “You’re not running off again and we’re not fucking, we’re having this out right now because I fucking can’t--” his voice breaks off at the end and Pete frowns, because he’s still not used to seeing Patrick get all teary like this. He wants to take everything back, he wants to have fought harder for Patrick to stay because he doesn’t know what damage  _ Soul Punk _ really did to him.

He sees it every now and then, when Patrick thinks he’s got it hidden. It’s that dazed, haunted look when they’re brushing their teeth, or how he tenses when he hears a beat that sounds similar to  _ Bad Side of 25 _ . The worst had been when Patrick had dyed and cut his hair back to how he used to wear it. Pete broke into a grin, but it fell when he saw Patrick’s drooping shoulders, like he had given in instead of won. 

“I just need to know that you’re not going to walk out again,” he whispers, closing his eyes because he can’t stand the way Patrick is looking at him right now. It’s not the irritated eyes with a knowing smile, it’s just disappointment. 

He can hear Patrick walking towards him, but Pete keeps his eyes shut, not trusting him just yet--or maybe he doesn’t trust himself. Then there’s something covering his ears, Pete’s eyes open and Patrick’s hands slip away. 

“Just listen to it,” he says, muffled by the ear phones. 

It’s a rough demo, but even Patrick’s rough demos sound like radio singles already. It’s still a little bouncy, kind of light and he’s focused on the instrumental of the intro that he jumps when he hears Patrick’s voice, because he usually never gets vocals this early one, because Pete hasn’t given him lyrics yet. 

Pete tries to prepare himself to give Patrick a blank expression and just say he likes the lyrics he’s sure he’s going to actually hate. He’s never liked Patrick’s empty lyrics, they were always so sterile, only written to go in time with the music he’s already built instead of finding the emotions and going from there. 

But he zeros in on  _ whisky eyes _ and  _ I miss missing you now and then _ and  _ I see you when we’re sitting in the dark _ and  _ I will sing to you everyday if it will take away the pain _ . 

Pete slips the headphones off and stares at Patrick, who is looking at his laptop pretending Pete is still listening to the song even though he’s seen that it’s ended. Pete takes the laptop off Patrick’s lap and closes it before setting it on the coffee table. Patrick looks a little distressed that he doesn’t have anything in his hands, so Pete fills them by straddling his lap. He circles Patrick’s wrists with his hands, stares at how his warm skin contrasts with the coolness of Patrick’s. He brings Patrick’s wrists up and holds them on either side of Patrick’s face against the back cushion of the couch. 

“You’re not leaving,” Pete murmurs, leaning in to hover just over his lips. 

Not a question, but Patrick confirms, “I’m not leaving.”

And then kisses him.

So Pete starts trying to catch the little ways Patrick has been trying to tell him that he loves him. It starts off the way they usually communicate, though music. They sit up and write in a way they haven’t since they were kids. Patrick writes music that is so encapsulating of everything that Pete is feeling. A little bouncy from nerves, kinda quick like they’re rushing to get this out before everyone changes their minds, but steady, like they’ve found solace in each other again. And Pete writes words that he didn’t think he could ever say to Patrick again, so he makes sure they’re things he’s been wanting to say for awhile. He wants Patrick to know that he’s been along for the ride the whole time. Even when Patrick got off, he was just waiting for him. 

_ To: Patrick--1:19PM _

_ I’m outside the door invite me in so we can go back and play pretend _

  
  


_ From: Patrick--1:31PM _

_ I live with you. You can just TELL me the lyrics now. _

  
  


_ To: Patrick--1:34PM _

_ Process babe. _

But there’s other ways that Patrick has been telling Pete that he loves him. Ways that he just took as him being Patrick. Things like setting out his medication next to a glass of orange juice in the morning. Or letting him pick out where they’re getting take out even though it’s Patrick’s turn. Or setting the teddy bear on their bed after Pete makes the bed. 

And they still haven’t really told anyone that they’re together, Pete wonders if they should make a big deal about it. It seems like it just sort of happened, not like it was this big secret they were keeping, but there’s a part of him that wants to scream from the rooftops that he’s in love with Patrick Stump--even if he really hasn’t told him that either. 

Andy raises his eyebrow when Pete sighs, “Babe, take a break,” after Patrick keeps belting out that ridiculous note in Phoenix. And Patrick blushes, eyes a little wide at the pet name and Pete tenses for a moment before Andy says, “So does that mean we can order lunch?”

And Joe just mutters, “Thank god,” and sets down his guitar to pull out his phone so he can see who’ll deliver. 

Pete winks at Patrick and his blush deepens. 

But then there are bigger things. Things that make Pete’s heart constrict so much that he thinks it’ll shatter. Big grand gestures, that aren’t really gestures at all--just Patrick being Patrick, and Pete is starting to learn that Patrick being Patrick is him being in love with Pete. 

He’s walking down the hall to say goodnight to Bronx when he hears that familiar chord, and then another and then, “ It doesn't matter how you feel, life is just a Ferris wheel”. Pete just stands outside the door and listens to Patrick sing to his kid. The kid that Patrick didn’t even know until recently. That had made him bitter when all of this went down in the beginning, how the most important person in his life didn’t even know his kid. But now he’s trying to make up for it. 

He’s getting on the floor and growling like a t-rex and putting green food coloring into the macaroni to make Bronx laugh. He’s letting him bang on Patrick’s guitar even though it makes him cringe and he’s following him around with a wet washcloth to wipe the sticky jam hand prints off the walls. 

And he’s singing Bronx to sleep with a song that Pete wrote on an album that Patrick hates. 

When they’re laying in bed later that night, Patrick says, “I’m not good with words,” in that way that makes Pete think of  cryptophasia, because that’s all that Pete has been thinking about lately. 

He turns onto his side and hooks his leg over Patrick’s hip, using it to pull him closer, smiling when Patrick looks all put off but hooks his arm over Pete’s shoulders. “I know, that’s why I write the lyrics,” he teases.

His smile spreads when Patrick huffs, “No that’s not--”

“I know,” Pete assures him, sneaking a quick kiss before saying, “Actions speak louder than words.”

Patrick pauses then brings his hand down to twist at the fabric of Pete’s shirt. “That’s not always the case. If it was, you would have realized a long time ago that I was never leaving you.”

Pete strokes his cheek. “You kinda were.”

“No, I wasn’t I just--”

Pete rolls his eyes. “Needed a break.”

“No, just...I don’t know how to explain it,” he sighs, “I--”

“Just talk to me,” Pete says, pulling him closer. 

Patrick snorts and,  _ Oh, Pete _ , “I’m trying, but you keep interrupting.” He eyes Pete with a stern expression and waits until Pete makes a dramatic locking motion over his lips before continuing, “It wasn’t you, Pete. I needed a break from Pete Wentz. I needed time away from the expectations. Not just from the pressures of having a failed album, no let me finish, it was a failed album. It doesn’t mean I  _ hate _ it. But, I swear to God don’t open your mouth, let me finish.” He waits until Pete sighs and bites his bottom lip, because it’s hard not to just cut in, but he lets him say, “I didn’t need a break from my best friend, if you remember I was still trying to talk to you, and before you try to say anything, I ignored your emails because you kept trying to talk business with me.”

Pete leans forward and rests his forehead against Patrick's. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

Patrick slides his hand up to cup his cheek. “I never left you. I was always there. I know I wasn’t physically with you everyday at the beginning, but I was always on the other end of that phone. I was always reading your posts. Always watching to see what you did with Black Cards. I was still cheering for you on the sidelines whether you looked off to the side or not.”

“It felt like you didn’t want to make music with me anymore,” Pete says in a tiny voice. 

“I didn’t want to make music with you like  _ that _ anymore. We weren’t working, there was too much stuff between us,” Patrick says. 

“Like what?” 

“Like probably why we’re in bed together right now,” he chuckles, “Among other things. Fame. Expectations. Jealousy. Living on top of each other for years.”

Pete just focuses on the obvious, the part that’s going to make Patrick roll his eyes again. “You wanted me back then?” 

Patrick doesn’t disappoint. 

*

Patrick looks like he’s going to be sick as the fire grows bigger.

The shot has been called and Andy has already started walking off the set. Joe lingers for a moment, looking between Pete and Patrick for a moment, then walks off as well. 

Pete focuses on the cover of  _ Take This to Your Grave  _ and how young they all look in that photo. He remembers the feeling of  _ this is happening _ when he held the record in his hand. Remembers looking at Joe like  _ we did it _ then looking at Patrick and thinking _ you did it _ . 

There’s some sadness watching it burn in front of him. It’s not like he isn’t proud of what they’ve done and how far they’ve come. That’s not really the point. 

He walks up behind Patrick and slips his arms around his waist, pressing his lips to the back of his neck. 

The point is to burn down the faulty foundation so that they can start over. 

*

Pete finds Patrick sitting cross-legged on the stage, just looking out to where the audience is going to be in about an hour. 

They had all been a little shocked when they saw the crowd lined up the venue, in this weather no less. Patrick’s been quiet ever since, only opening his mouth to do vocal exercises, which made Pete nervous since he never really did vocal exercises. 

It’s like that first show all over again. He’s buzzing out of his skin, he’s staring off and seeing things that haven’t happened, all the things that could go wrong. He’s sitting there thinking about how he’s going to fail again.

“Don’t you think we should be looking at bigger venues?” Pete had asked when he saw where they were going for the tour, “those aren’t going to hold all the kids.”

Patrick had scoffed. “I’m sure we won’t even fill these.”

And Pete just stared at him like he had lost his damn mind. They had been gone for years, of course there’s going to be a crowd.  _ Of course they’re going to come see you _ . 

“We’ve been gone for too long,” Patrick said, as if answering his thoughts, and Pete’s just come to accept that after all these years, “You don’t disappear like that and just expect to be back on top again.”

“We will be,” Pete had promised.

Then the night before the show, Patrick hadn’t slept. And when Patrick didn’t sleep, Pete didn’t sleep. 

He made all the tea they had in the house, all those stupid packets of “Sleepytime Tea” and it did nothing. 

“Told you tea doesn’t do anything,” Pete had mumbled, thinking about all the chamomile tea that Patrick always gets Pete when he’s anxious. 

Patrick rolled his eyes and laid back against the pillows, turning off the lamp and huffing. Pete gave him another hour of rolling onto his back, to his side, on his stomach before, “Alright that’s it, get up.”

Patrick frowned as Pete pulled him out of bed and took him into the bathroom. He had to dig out all the bath toys from Bronx, then he filled it with hot water and Bonx’s s bedtime bubble bath. 

“So this is supposed to work, but tea doesn’t?” Patrick grumbled, because only he could still be grumpy in a bubble bath. 

Pete just smiled fondly and pulled Patrick’s wet back against his chest, nuzzling at the back of his neck where the damp hair tickled his nose. “It usually puts Bronx to sleep.”

“I’m not a baby. Baby soap is not going to put me to sleep,” he huffed and Pete’s smile stretched out to a grin against Patrick. 

“Why are you so worked up,” Pete asked softly, “if you don’t think anyone is going to show up anyway?”

Patrick had been quiet for a moment, considering, probably trying to put his rambling thoughts into something that resembled a sentence. Pete knew the feeling, so he sat patiently, tracing sudsy shapes against Patrick’s shoulder. 

“What if they do?” He asked in a small voice, so small that Pete wanted to bundle him up in bubble wrap and keep him from ever getting hurt again. 

“That’s what we want,” he had reminded him gently, “But even if it doesn’t happen--it’s going to be ok. We just need to get back on a stage together.”

Patrick leaned his head back on Pete’s shoulder and looked up at him. “It didn’t feel right playing without you. I kept looking for you on stage.”

Pete’s heart leaped and he cupped his jaw. “I’m not going anywhere,” he murmured before kissing him, then, just to remind him, “Neither are you.”

Pete’s shoes squeak against the stage as he makes his way to Patrick. He looks up at Pete and smiles a little bashful, “I just wanted to get in the right mindset.”

Pete sits down next to him, shuffling his bag so that it sits behind him, “Are you getting there?”

He shrugs and looks down at his dingy converses, which makes Pete smile. Even after his little “glow up” of fashion during  _ Soul Punk _ , he never gave a shit about shoes because “they’re shoes, Pete, they protect your feet.” 

“I got you something,” Pete says softly, pulling his bag into his lap, trying not to grin at Patrick’s expression. He always got weird about gifts and tried to look put off by them, or nonchalant, but everyone fucking loved getting gifts and Patrick would eventually beam at Pete, grinning like a kid on Christmas morning. 

Pete keeps the air of suspense for a moment and Patrick slaps him on the arm. “Oh come on,” he laughs, “What is it?”

The reunion show was making them all nostalgic. On the flight over, Pete leaned against Patrick and, as Patrick stroked his hair and hummed softly to combat the flight anxiety, Pete thought about their first show. It wasn’t something he liked to do often, especially lately, but it was hard not to keep the images from showing up behind his closed eyelids. 

How they all stood outside DePaul University, huddled together like a gang while they watched everyone trickle inside, and Pete could feel the nerves radiating off Patrick. He had pulled him off to the side and dug inside his backpack before pulling out a trucker hat and slipping it on his head, pulling it down over Patrick’s eyes. 

“Stop!” He had huffed, “I can’t see that way.”

“Exactly,” Pete beamed.

“Oh,” Patrick says now when Pete pulls out the fedora. 

“I thought that trucker hats wouldn’t really go well with your style now,” Pete grins, putting it on top of his head. “It’s not training wheels, you can still see, think of it as a safety blanket.”

Patrick reached forward, fingers twisting in Pete’s shirt and pulled him close. “Pete, I--” his voice choked off, but Pete could see it written all over Patrick’s face. His grin, bright and his eyes full of fire. That little shake of his head, his  _ Oh, Pete _ , how he swallowed like all the words that Patrick thought he wasn’t good at were getting caught up in the moment too. 

“I know,” Pete whispers, putting his hand over Patrick’s and pulling it off his shirt so he can press it over his heart, “Me too.”

Because Pete has always been great at words, and big gestures have sort of always been his thing. But the little things always slipped by him. Little things that always meant big things. Things like arguing over paint swatches, eating pancakes together, or going to the aquarium. They all pile up on top of each other, so that the  _ bigger _ things--things like Patrick singing to his son, like saving each other from drowning in their own misery and self doubt, things like writing music together--add the sparks that light the fire to burn Pete back to life. 

*

After years of feeling cold and numb, Patrick, Patrick with his fiery eyes and knowing smile, with the voice that saved Pete’s life and gentle hands that’s put him back together so many times, Patrick who is staring at him under the stage lights, wraps his arm around Pete’s shoulders and they scream, “Me and Pete in the wake of Saturday”.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still REALLY new to this fandom, so a lot of research went into this fic. This [post](https://earlgreytea68.tumblr.com/post/187994148766/its-my-fobiversary) was a life saver and really anything that [earlgreytea68](https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlgreytea68/pseuds/earlgreytea68) writes is pretty amazing!


End file.
